


The Hotel

by SkipandDi (ladyflowdi)



Series: Moments from the Infiltrate Universe [14]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Bottom John Watson, Fingerfucking, Light Bondage, M/M, Power Dynamics, Power Play, Rimming, Top Sherlock, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-26
Updated: 2015-09-26
Packaged: 2018-04-23 12:07:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4876207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladyflowdi/pseuds/SkipandDi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Right now, however, there are no cases, his experiments are in a holding period, and the children are for once all appropriately occupied. It’s finally time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Hotel

**Author's Note:**

> And here we are, the end of the Infiltrate stories, on today, the anniversary of when we started posting them five years ago. In the intervening years we’ve moved on to other things and other fandoms, but our love for Infiltrate and John and Sherlock has never waned. I hope you all have enjoyed them as much as Skip and I enjoyed writing them!! :) 
> 
> And now, The Hotel. Enjoy!

It’s time.

There are always cases, something dull if no one can be bothered to commit a crime inventively. There are crimes, and when there aren't interesting ones there are the constant school events, or social events, or various personal crises that all four of Sherlock's children seem to think warrant his total, unwavering attention. There are his experiments upstairs, his experiments at the laboratory Lestrade had set up for him at the MET, his pet project on identifying the twenty eight hundred strains of cotton fibers manifested in Great Britain. 

Right now, however, there are no cases, his experiments are in a holding period, and the children are for once all appropriately occupied.

It’s finally time.

He makes a few phone calls.

"You're wholly under-dressed," he tells John ten minutes later.  
  
John is rifling through papers at the kitchen table, the dissatisfied sergeant expression on his face, which means he's doing the bills. Sherlock's timing is twice as fortunate. "Stop complaining about this jumper, Sherlock, or I swear I'll wear it to my grave."  
  
Sherlock rolls his eyes. "That'll be difficult after I set it on fire later, unless you plan to appropriately mourn the loss with a literal sackcloth and ashes." John looks up, completely unamused, and Sherlock hurries on. "We're going out. Get dressed."  
  
"Out where?" John asks, turning the question into a protest. "And why? And who’s supposed to watch the kids? Mrs. Hudson--"  
  
The sound of the door to the flat opening makes John pause, and when he sees Franz he gets the most delightfully confused look on his face. Of course once he's looking back at Sherlock it's become suspicion, but still, much more entertaining than staring balefully at the ceiling. "What are you doing?"  
  
"For pity's sake, taking you out. You know I hate repeating myself."  
  
John evaluates him through his glasses and stands, agreeing more because he's happy to get away from the bills than because he believes Sherlock has something good up his sleeve. Sherlock placidly stares back. "We're going to be late if you don't hurry."  
  
"I suppose you've picked out what I'm supposed to wear?"  
  
Sherlock doesn't even bother answering, just rifles through the receipts -- how John hasn't figured out Lucy's been inviting that obnoxious boy over when they're not home he doesn't know, but it seems as though Sherlock will have to resolve the matter himself on the next occasion -- and John just sighs and goes to change.  
  
He emerges from the bedroom five minutes later, dark jeans, well-fitted black jumper, mid-length grey trench. Sherlock tries not to smirk.  
  
"Daddy, can I--" Lucy pauses in the living room as she sees her parents. "Those are nice clothes, Papa," she says, gesturing at John.

John frowns but Sherlock tilts his head in triumph. "Thank you."

"Who’s gonna watch us while you're on your date?" she continues, her intended request entirely forgotten.  
  
"Who said this was a date?" John asks, surprised.  
  
"It's obvious," Lucy says, and while she occasionally drives Sherlock to distraction, she also has moments of gorgeous, brilliant perception. "Papa was bored, you were cranky, now you're all dressed up. Papa's killing two birds with one stone."  
  
"That's the most ridiculous explanation I've ever heard," John says, but doesn't actually argue the point, an amused tilt sliding across his mouth.  
  
"Papa, I can't find -- you didn't say you were going on a date," Andrew says, bumbling his giraffian limbs into the room.  
  
John rolls his eyes. "We're not required to inform you of our schedule," Sherlock says, "and if we don't leave now I'm fairly certain the traffic to Twickenham will make us late."  
  
It's genuinely amusing to watch John's entire face light up. "Twickenham? We're going to see a rugby match?"  
  
"I'm assuming the term 'Double Header' means there'll be two." He tries not to be too blatantly entertained by his husband's full-body twitch of happiness, or the way John is suddenly herding Sherlock towards the door.  
  
"Be good, don't bother Franz, don't you dare have more than one dessert Andrew, let's go, bye--" It's near to a shove out onto the landing as John closes the door behind them. "How did you get tickets like this? It's got to be sold out."  
  
"There's always room in the box, John." He tries to get down the stairs but John's snagging him by the collar, swinging him around to kiss him on the mouth, light and dirty.  
  
He smiles against Sherlock's lips like a mischievous teen. "You can be quite charming when you want to be."  
  
"Just wait," Sherlock says, seized by a sudden inspiration that makes his grin turn sharp, "I'm only getting started."   


 

.  
  
John's never been to a live professional rugby match.  
  
He's been an avid fan for most of his life -- some of his most treasured memories were of sitting beside his father on their beaten old blue sofa in his office and watching the matches on their old antenna telly. He'd loved it at school, even though he'd been too short and too skinny to qualify for the school team, and he'd loved it in the Army, whenever he'd been able to catch a game. Even in Afghanistan, at the Kandahar field hospital where he'd been assigned for his first tour, he and the lads would settle down for a match in the early hours of the morning, watching it live on the gritty old telly one of the American doctors had bought in the capital.  
  
To be going to one, though -- and a Double Header season opener -- has him so excited he's grinning like a kid before they've slid into the car Sherlock had hired. "What brought this on?"  
  
Sherlock arches a brow at him. "Can't I spoil my husband once in a while?"  
  
"Considering the last time you decided to 'spoil' me was that godforsaken trip to Gainsborough, where you spent the better part of our trip fucking about looking for that map..."  
  
"It was interesting."  
  
"It was for a case, which you didn't tell me about until after the fact," John corrects, eying him suddenly. "Someone’s been murdered at Twickenham."  
  
"People die everyday," Sherlock replies, lips curved with amusement. "You really can't fathom that I'd take you somewhere just for your enjoyment? What about our weekend in Paris?"  
  
"Doesn't count, we spent it at the Police Nationale after that old man was found dead in his room," John says, slashing a hand through the air. The other has been caught with Sherlock's, their fingers entwined on the seat between them. "I didn't even get to see the Eiffel Tower."  
  
"And the trip to Spain."  
  
"Holiday with the kids, also doesn't count considering that you all spent it in the toilet."  
  
It had been absolute hell: Monica, Sherlock and Andrew got food poisoning, Lucy got a sunburn so awful she cried for a week, and Kaden decided it would be a brilliant opportunity to taste the sand, ate at least five handfuls of it, and spent their entire holiday on the pot, screaming and crying. By the time they'd got home John had been so exhausted that he'd slept for two days straight.  
  
"Oh? Then what about the Bed and Breakfast in Newcastle?"  
  
John goes pink. "We spent it in bed."  
  
Sherlock's smirks, wicked and smug; he leans in to nuzzle along John's neck. "I remember."  
  
Just the memory of it makes him shiver, and he feels Sherlock smile along the tendon of his neck. "Is that your intention, then?"  
  
"Surely you know by now it's always my intention."  
  
And it is, for heaven's sake, they're both like bloody _teenagers_ , it would be embarrassing if John didn't love it, the hum of arousal, the pleasure and excitement of where they're going, combined with the heady, intoxicating thought that afterwards, if he was lucky, Sherlock would spread him out and make him lose his mind. He shivers again and Sherlock brings their intertwined fingers to his mouth, kisses his knuckles lightly.  
  
They spend the drive in teasing each other, exchanging playful touches designed to satisfy, to communicate. It's taken Sherlock years to learn this particular language, and he still only speaks it with any fluency to John, but it's delightful nonetheless, in its own way.  
  
The match itself is spectacularly uninteresting in Sherlock's opinion, but he isn’t there to watch it so that hardly matters. He spends the time watching the other patrons, the waitresses, and of course John. Aesthetically they are an odd match, but somehow it works; on days like today, when Sherlock has been able to drag John out of his lumpy jumpers and frankly awful army jackets, he can acknowledge the striking, complementary nature of the contrast. In any case it's not Sherlock the waitress is eying as she brings them overpriced food and in John's case, far too much beer.  
  
"Did you see that?" John asks, the hand not holding his beer waving wildly.  
  
"No,” Sherlock says, eyes on the MP several seats over who’s cheating on his wife with his secretary, who is in turn also sleeping with an up-and-coming aide. The sexually transmitted diseases should make for an interesting divorce proceeding.  
  
When he glances up John is looking at him, a silly, amused, utterly besotted tilt to his mouth. It's almost embarrassing. "What?"  
  
"You really did bring me here just to watch the match."  
  
"We've been here three hours, John, even you aren't typically this slow."  
  
John just laughs, eyes bright. "With you it pays to be wary."  
  
Sherlock grins. "Quite so."  
  
The game winds down and whichever team wins is to John's satisfaction. Sherlock's spent the last half-an-hour texting ahead and fielding various requests from their children who seem completely incapable of functioning independently, it's incredible. At one point Sherlock has to call and order Kaden to stop hiding all of Andrew's trainers to keep him in the house as it's technically a form of economic abuse. Thankfully John had been too busy hollering at the opposing team or the referee or whomever is on the field to even notice.  
  
As they stand to leave John blinks up at Sherlock in a way that means he's mildly, pleasantly inebriated. "Hopefully Franz will have given them dinner by now, unless you want to pick up something on the way."  
  
Sherlock doesn't comment on John's complete jump into the topic sans context but instead says, "Unless you want to carry take away through Brixton for the next four hours I think not."  
  
"What's in Brixton?" John asks. "Is this where the investigation starts?"  
  
"You're ridiculous,” Sherlock tells him. "And no. Supposedly it's where there will be an adequate rendition of Elgar, among others; we'll see how they carry it outdoors without the assistance of chamber acoustics." He herds John towards the exit with a hand on his lower back and leans in close. "Perhaps if you're lucky I'll suck you off in the car on the way."    
  


.  
  
Sherlock, in fact, does not suck him off in the car, though that's more because of his disgruntlement with the sycophants who'd given Sherlock the box in the first place (falling over each other to suck up to 'Lord Holmes', and if John weren't already fully aware of how much Sherlock hated it, he would have laughed -- alright, laughed _less_ ) than because they aren't both of them engaged in foreplay. He rants for the first thirty minutes into Brixton about 'ridiculous, archaic proprietary notions of land, Abingdon didn't belong to him any more than the blood river Thames did, when would the modern British people stop being so utterly fussed with ideas of aristocracy', and besides it was all Mycroft’s fault anyway, and John listens with half an ear, humming in all the right parts.  
  
"You're falling asleep," Sherlock says, cutting himself off at some point in his rant -- it had shifted to his study of the prominent familial blood lines and their connections to commoners less than four hundred years ago. Not that John had been listening, particularly, only that he could follow along, almost verbatim, considering Sherlock had ranted about this very subject many times before.  
  
"Sorry love," John says, relaxed. "Andrew gets it from me."  
  
'It' being that, whenever Andrew was in a moving vehicle for longer than ten minutes, he fell completely to sleep. It had saved John's life the years Sherlock was gone -- sometimes, calling a cab and riding around Baker Street until Andrew fell asleep in his carrier was the only way his son would sleep through the night.  
  
Sherlock's eyes narrow. "And that has nothing to do with the beer you drank."  
  
"Has everything to do with it," John says, yawning, and lays his head on Sherlock's shoulder, pretending not to notice how even now, nine into their marriage, the act still makes Sherlock freeze with surprise, then slowly, slowly melt. He smiles in the dark of the car. "And the Language Arts fair, of course."  
  
That his son had built the entire fourth act of _Henry V_ out of Styrofoam wasn't what had worried him -- the sheer oddness and brilliance of his kid no longer surprised him. The fully functioning model canons and fireworks, on the other hand, had instigated the row to end all rows. Sherlock had walked in during the middle of it and Kaden, in all the chaos, set off one of the canons. Needless to say, John spent an hour picking the tiny canon out of Sherlock's stomach and sewing two tiny stitches, and Andrew spent it bawling and soaking Sherlock's shoulder with his tears.  
  
Sherlock hums above him, amused, and John laces their fingers together, studying the way their knuckles fit together. "What have you got planned after Brixton?"  
  
"Why do you ask?"  
  
John brings their intertwined fingers close, kissing them first before leading them low over the hard tension of his belly. "No reason."  
  
Sherlock takes note of John's positioning but deliberately makes no outward acknowledgment, subtly provoking. "Then I'm sure you won't mind being kept in suspense."  
  
John huffs against Sherlock's shoulder, but it's clearly all for show.  "You're incorrigible."  
  
Sherlock snorts. "Surely you've not just realized as much."  
  
"Of course not, but it's still as baffling as ever." John is slowly sliding into sleep, accurate to the letter about their son not falling far from the tree.  
  
But sleep won't do, not yet, so Sherlock tilts his head in John's direction, lets his lips hover near John's hairline as he speaks. "We can always go back to Tottenham, what do you think?" He can't see John's eyes fly open but knows they do all the same. Sherlock smirks against John's forehead and continues, "After all, the last trip ended rather well."  
  
The last trip had begun with Sherlock summoning John via the homeless network to meet him in a dank, dark, dirty warehouse in a particularly rough part of the borough, and letting him wander until he found the center of the action, where Sherlock naturally had to be. He'd also been shirtless and in the middle of a two-round bare-knuckle boxing match. He'd dragged the fight out entirely for John's benefit, toying with his opponent (who admittedly managed a few good hits) until John was entirely pink in the face, staring with his eyes wide, his lips unconsciously parted. Sherlock had waited, and waited, and _waited_ , and then had swiftly taken the man down in the most ruthless way he could, and handily won a thousand pounds in the process. John had looked at him like Sherlock was entirely debauched, like he was something _illicit_ , stared him down in a way that had Sherlock straining against his trousers as they rushed to the first hotel they could find, too impatient to make it all the way home.  
  
It began with a trip to Tottenham, and ended in the most intense, brutal, _fantastic_ sex they'd ever had; it ended with an implosion that wiped them both out for _days_.  
  
"You can't be serious,” John says, shifting to sit up.

Sherlock lets him then leans forward again, this time pressing his lips to the edge of John's jaw. "Of course I'm not serious, but look, now you're wide awake."   
  
"You're _awful_ ," John says, eyes narrowing to slits in pleasure as Sherlock's mouth strokes, feather-light, up along his jaw to his earlobe. It makes him shiver, makes him snort out a breathylittle laugh. "Is that what you want, then? What you've been angling for?”  
  
The idea of it is wonderful, _glorious_ , as it always is; lovemaking with Sherlock is like an explosion, a bomb going off in his cerebral cortex, bright and hot and beautiful. Being inside Sherlock makes him lose his mind, makes him forget his own _name_. He squirms as Sherlock sucks at his earlobe, drags his teeth gently along the fragile skin. "You've got to stop," he hears himself say, painfully aware of the driver, of where they are. " _Sherlock_."  
  
Sherlock hums, content and gorgeous and _awful_ , and lets him go with one last sharp nip to his earlobe. John's glad for the long coat tonight, _glad_ because he knows his body, and this kind of prolonged foreplay can only go so far before John can't will his blood down anymore and he embarrasses the entire family. Worse still if it's Sherlock -- he can see him on the front bloody page of the Daily Mail -- _Lord Holmes Hard Up_ , with a half-page picture of him walking around with his cock tenting his trousers.  
  
The thought makes him chortle on a laugh, and Sherlock's eyes crinkle. He brushes his fingers through John's hair. "Something funny?"  
  
"You."  
  
It's the same expression he'd worn when they'd caught Monica singing for the first time, that first moment they'd realized she was theirs. She'd been wearing Lucy's pink leggings and a green bathing suit on top, singing on top of her lungs. When she'd caught them laughing themselves to pieces in the doorway she'd glared at them fiercely enough to rival Lucy.  
  
John grins, lays his head back on Sherlock's shoulder. "You haven't let on what Elgar is yet. Are they a nineties pop revival band or something?"  
  
"You're not amusing,” Sherlock tells him.  
  
John's grin grows wider still. "I think I'm hilarious."  
  
"You would,” Sherlock answers, thumb sliding over John's knuckles. He thinks happily on his current state: pleasantly distracted, largely entertained. John has given him this without even trying, without even being aware of it, of the power he has over Sherlock. It's fascinating, and occasionally horrifying, to know just how big a difference one person can make in Sherlock's life, when Sherlock had prided himself for so long on needing no one. It startles him too, how often he considers John as simply another part of himself. Making John happy -- surprising him, pleasing him, taking him apart as Sherlock plans to do tonight -- is just as enjoyable as indulging himself, if not more so, since the results with John are often unpredictable. He's looking forward to what John will do next, when he realizes they're not walking past Claridge's but in, when they open the doors to the suite. It should prove a highlight.  
  
They make it to Brixton without a minute to spare, sliding along the edge of the crowd to come up around the side, sitting on a low stone wall where it's mostly students and young bohemian types. The orchestra is of a satisfactory quality, even in the arena setting, the sound drowning out the incessant chatter, the cacophonous, pointless noise, until there is just the music, the facts, the existence of everything around Sherlock as a state of being, as nothing that need be explicated into words. He watches the people around him in silence for some time, while the notes wrap his mind in cotton and he wraps his hand around John's. After the second movement he leans back and feels his world turn to a blissful, blissfully _still_ place to be. It is utterly gorgeous.  
  
His mind keeps track of the time in a distant sort of way, but it still somehow surprises him when he feels John tugging lightly at his hand as the orchestra finishes. Sherlock opens his eyes -- unaware of when they fell closed -- and blinks down at his husband, whose eyes are almost neon in the light of the setting sun.   
  
The students and other young people start shifting, standing during the brief intermission between sets, but they stay sitting there together on the low wall. John loves Sherlock's dreamy, far-away look; loves it more when it sharpens on him and comes into focus. He reaches up and kisses him, those soft, full lips opening to him as they always, always did.  
  
People are milling about, waiting for the next set -- Chopin -- to begin; John kisses the corner of Sherlock's mouth, his cheek and jaw, proud of himself, of them both, for getting here, to this point, of being so comfortable with themselves and each other. He lets go with a smile, thumbs along the sloping bow of Sherlock's lower lip. "The man, four o'clock, blond hair and shabby trousers."  
  
Sherlock's eyes widen a tick, then fall low with amusement. He turns to look, studies him for a moment. John loves watching his mind work, eyes skipping over the man so fast no one could ever hope to keep up. "Hardly a challenge, John. Works in lithography, graduate student from a poor coastal village who's behind on student loans, but that's only because he's dating the woman he's going to ask to marry... tonight, or perhaps tomorrow."  
  
"No possible way you can know all that," John replies, doing his part and immensely enjoying the smug expression on Sherlock's face.  
  
"Isn't it obvious?"  
  
"Tell me."  
  
"Lithography -- there's lithograph ink smudged on his jacket, which is at least five years old and being held together with hope and what is likely hemmer’s tape, judging by the crease under his left arm. It doesn't fit him as well as it used to, something which he undoubtedly found out tonight when he brought his girlfriend here. He's been living on the lean for at least four or five months. A student--"  
  
"Obviously."  
  
"Obviously, by his key tab," Sherlock answers, smirking down at him. "Oxford blue."  
  
"How do you know he's going to ask his girlfriend to marry him?"  
  
"Aside from the lost weight, he keeps checking his jacket pocket," Sherlock says, and sure enough the young man nervously pats his coat when his girlfriend is turned away speaking to the other couple they came with.  
  
"That's brilliant. And how do you know where he comes from?"  
  
"His father is a fisherman, judging by the style of shoes."  
  
"His loafers?"  
  
"Particular brand, sold only in coastal villages to the south of London, at least thirty years old. They're his father's loafers, gifted to him when he came out to the city to go to school."  
  
John smiles. "I hope he gets the courage to ask her. She's beautiful."  
  
"And a chronic masturbator."  
  
John chokes on nothing, coughing so hard everyone around them turns to look at him; Sherlock is _laughing_ at him and John wheezes and elbows him in the ribs, mumbling apologies to the other patrons as the maestro signals the beginning of the set. "You're bloody awful," he says once he's got his breath back.  
  
Sherlock shushes him, as if _he's_ being the ridiculous one, as the music begins.  
  
Chopin comes and goes as night settles in and the city lights up. John sits under Sherlock's arm, tucked into Sherlock's side, utterly at ease. The crowd swells as the music crescendos and they end up pressed close together, close enough for Sherlock to lean his head on John's, ruffle his hair with every breath. Sherlock often commandeers John's body for his own uses: unthinkingly throws himself across or on top of John, shuffles him here or there, moves him as he pleases. For all John's grumbling in truth he rarely actually complains. Sherlock knows the man well enough to realize he appreciates the casual appropriation, relishes it even, the physical demonstration of Sherlock's interest, proof that it hasn't waned, at least for one more day. Sherlock doesn't mind proving himself over and over again, not in this unique case.  
  
When the concert finally wraps they slowly, slowly disentangle, standing up, stretching out. "Should I get us a cab?" John asks, looking around, clearly thinking how difficult it will be with the entire crowd now dispersing as well.  
  
"No point,” Sherlock says. "We can walk faster." He takes John by the hand, lets him adjust his gait after so much time sitting, and then starts them in the wrong direction for their home.  
  
"Any point in asking what's next?" John says, looking up.  
  
"When you enjoy surprises so much?" Sherlock shakes his head. "You'll know soon enough."  
  
They walk in companionable silence for much of the way, until Sherlock spots one of Lucy's language teachers in a restaurant. He and John start their usual back and forth over the children's educational needs and trying to think of new ways to convince Kaden to keep his clothes on in public settings. The time passes quickly and Sherlock has to dart for his phone when he realizes how close they are.  
  
"--and I know it bothers you but frankly I'd rather have him in wellies than be shoeless. What are you doing?" John says.  
  
"Have you suddenly gone blind?" Sherlock asks back, pressing the dial button. John gives him an exasperated look.  
  
Monica answers the phone on the second ring. _"Papa when are you coming home?"_ she asks in one long breath.  
  
"Tomorrow. Put the phone on speaker so this doesn't take all night." There is a shuffle and the painfully loud beep of buttons being accidentally pushed, then suddenly Kaden is yelling, _"Papa why aren't you and Daddy back yet_? _"_  
  
"I'm not deaf, I can hear you without the shouting,” Sherlock says. "We'll be back tomorrow. Be good for Franz."  
  
_"Where is Daddy?"_ Monica asks.  
  
"Right here, give me a moment,” Sherlock says. "Where are the rest of your siblings?"  
  
_"Lucy is upstairs on the phone, Andrew is right here_ , _"_ Monica reports.  
  
"One of you go and get her, please." God knows there will be an unholy crisis if they aren't all allowed a good night first.  
  
_"Is Daddy gonna say night too?"_ Kaden presses.  
  
"Yes, child, _wait_ ,” Sherlock says. "Your father is right here."  
  
_"Daddy_ , _"_ Kaden corrects.  
  
"It's the same person, Kaden,” Sherlock says, rolling his eyes. Kaden is going through a pronoun phase that could possibly drive Sherlock insane before he's moved on.  
  
_"He's Daddy_ , _"_ Kaden argues.  
  
"Your -- Daddy -- is right here,” Sherlock says.  
  
Sherlock hands the phone over while John stifles his laugh, as he always does when Sherlock gets into these ridiculous arguments with their youngest. God save Sherlock from his little one’s demands. "What do you mean, tomorrow?" John asks. "What are you up to?"  
  
Sherlock waves his phone hand out next to them, to the main entryway at Claridge’s, where a doorman is patiently waiting with the door open. "We're here."   
  
The hotel lobby is utterly breathtaking, and seeing it, Kaden in his ear chattering away about Franz and Andrew and his Legos and his supper, John realizes just how well he's been managed. He stares at Sherlock, putting the phone against his chest and demanding, "What did you do?"  
  
"What?"  
  
"Did you burn a hole through the floor boards again?"  
  
"What? _John_."  
  
John slashes a hand through the air. "Was it an accident? Is that why you're having the car 'serviced'?"  
  
"You are the most ridiculous human being I've ever met," Sherlock announces with a roll of his eyes, and abandons him in the middle of all of that ridiculous splendor for the check-in desk.  
  
_"Daddy!"_ Kaden demands in his ear, and John rubs his face, wondering if he's going to have to get the plumber back out -- the last time Sherlock did something even remotely as lovely as this evening, he was experimenting with pipes and water pressure and made all three toilets in their house explode. John groans, scrubs his face. "Sorry love, I'm here. Is Lucy there?”  
  
There's a scuffle, Gladstone barks joyfully, and then Lucy says, _"Hi, Daddy, we’re all here."_  
  
"Alright kids, I just wanted to tell you where your Papa and I are going to be tonight, in case of emergency."  
  
Sherlock returns, key card in hand. John stares at Sherlock, who, despite his annoyance, is looking down at him with just the right amount of smug glee that makes something in John flick _on_.  
  
_"I know Daddy, Franz told us already,"_ Lucy is telling him, using her grown up voice. _"Everyone had their bath already, except Andrew but I told Franz already and he's going to make him. Everybody ate too, and Mrs. Hudson was here and gave us hot cocoa, and she said that you and Papa going on a date was fun and then she told us about her boyfriend. Did you know Mrs. Hudson has a boyfriend?"_  
  
John rubs his face, staring at Sherlock between his fingers. Sherlock smirks. "No, baby, I certainly didn't know she had a boyfriend. Let’s all say good night now."  
  
He hears a scuffle, then a chorus of good nights, and a big, sloppy kiss against the receiver from Kaden ( _"Ew Kaden!"_ Monica yells in the background), and then Lucy says, _"Now Papa."_  
  
John hands the phone over, not quite able to help the silly, indulgent smile as they go through the same thing with Sherlock. He hangs up with the children and John asks, "You really didn't do anything?"  
  
" _No_ , I really didn't do anything," Sherlock says. "You're getting suspicious in your old age, John, and I have to tell you it isn't becoming."  
  
"It's only suspicion if you're innocent." John glares. "Let me remind you of the Great Garbage Disposal Debacle."  
  
Sherlock rolls his eyes. It shouldn't be as attractive as it is. "O _ne_ household appliance and I never hear the end of it."  
  
"And the washing machine, don't forget about that."  
  
"It was broken. I merely repaired it."  
  
"It was _fine_ , and the flat smelled of dirty clothes for a solid week, it was atro--"  
  
The lift dings, the doors open, and John stands, frozen, inside.  
  
It's a suite, and for a moment John thinks about the sad state of affairs that is his life when the sight of a living space sans dirty dishes and toys and backpacks and trainers fills him with this sort of awe.  
  
He can feel the glee radiating from Sherlock, but he can't help stepping slowly inside, staring at the thick, lavish sofas, the molding, the chandeliers. His shoes sink into the carpet. He's never seen such beautiful silk drapes, and the _ceiling_ \-- he stares up at it and can't quite believe anybody could ever make something so ornate, so gorgeous. Sherlock leans in close, murmurs in his ear, "I thought I'd give you something nice to look at."  
  
"The ceiling?" It hits him a moment later; he snorts out a laugh, turning his face into Sherlock's neck. "You're impossible."  
  
"Just improbable,” Sherlock corrects, tilting John's face, moving his own so they align, so perfectly precise. He maps the contours of John's mouth with his tongue, traces his favorite spots over and again once more. John groans, low and utterly shameless. His fingers push Sherlock's coat off his shoulders, drops it in a puddle on the floor by their feet.  
  
"No rush,” Sherlock says, the words muffled against John's lips. "I have you for the entire night." He pulls back enough to appraise his work -- John's red, bitten lips, mussed hair, wide, dark eyes. Sherlock's been teasing John the whole night; teasing both of them, really, but there's plenty of time still.  
  
"Come on," he says, and pulls John towards the bathroom.  
  
It's as ornate and sumptuous as the rest of the suite, and John stares at the ridiculously enormous tub with something like wonderment. "Not a bath toy in sight,” Sherlock says, starting the water.  
  
John snorts. "No towels piled by the door either. I'd forgotten what the floor of a bathroom was meant to look like."  
  
"Unacceptable,” Sherlock teases. He pulls John towards him, and begins to take the man apart.  
  
The coat is first -- he slides if off John's shoulders, sucking on his neck along the way, trailing his hands carefully down John's back. The jumper is next, the shirt along with it, Sherlock's fingers pressing up John's sides, across his chest, around to his shoulders. Sherlock brings John's fingers into his mouth, one, two at a time.  
  
Then he's down on his knees, removing shoes and socks, unzipping John's trousers, undoing the button. Every soft sound is drowned out by the sound of water filling the oversized tub, lending to the almost surreal quality of the night. Half of Sherlock's brain is still drifting on the wave of the music, unwinding him from the inside out. John's skin is flushed and he is half hard under his pants; Sherlock mouths the side of it through thin cotton, deliberately off target. John shudders, once, like he can’t help it, his head tilted back and adam’s apple bobbing, and then it's time for the pants to come down too.   
  
He's never felt more naked in front of Sherlock; he's down to the skin while Sherlock is still almost fully dressed, but it's more than that. The way Sherlock is looking at him, his low humming, his touch. He shivers and braces himself on Sherlock's shoulder, smiles down at him when Sherlock looks up, lips curved. The slight difference in height between them means he only has to reach down a little to touch his mouth to Sherlock's, fingers stroking in his hair.  
  
They so rarely go this slow -- most of the time they're trading blowjobs in the shower, or standing up somewhere, or quickly shoving each other’s hands in their pants in bed before the kids get up. He isn't nervous, not quite that. Too many years married to Sherlock has cured him of any and all hang-ups he'd ever had about sex. This feels like... like _anticipation_ , and he tugs Sherlock up by the shirt collar and turns them, one-two-three quick steps so Sherlock is pushed up against the bathroom sink and he's finally, finally got Sherlock between his legs, where he ought to always be.

He kisses him, sharper now, nipping at his lower button and tugging his shirt open to get his hands on skin. His palms skip over muscles, ribs, then lower, over the faded scar on Sherlock’s side that was Moriarty’s doing. It’s a faded pink semi-circle now, neat and tidy, where once it was a jagged, torn wound. He presses his fingers just there, ownership. Sherlock is  _his_ to do with as he pleases, always will be, and where once that filled him with sharp, almost frantic terror at the weight of such a responsibility, it has softened with time into what he has come to acknowledge as self-satisfied contentment, that  _he_ should have this beautiful creature.

Sherlock is hard, gloriously, wonderfully hard against his thigh, and John shudders at the feel of it. Sometimes there's such an open yearning inside of him for this that it makes him want to rub himself all over Sherlock's body, rub that glorious cock against himself, against his cheek, his mouth. The smell of him, that masculine scent of cologne and sweat, light along his chest and thicker, headier under his arms and between his legs, makes John moan, and shudder, and finally drop to his knees. He noses into Sherlock's open flies, and the  _heat_ of Sherlock's arousal has him gripping Sherlock's trousers at the belt to keep control of himself. "Get this  _off_ ."

Sherlock can't help the enormously smug expression he knows is on his face. It's incredibly unusual for John to be the one rushing things along, impatiently trying to expose more skin. There is an expression John gets -- something just shy of pain, where his eyes are squeezed shut and his bottom lip has been sucked into his mouth -- that only appears once in a blue moon, on days when Sherlock has managed to drive him thoroughly out of his mind with frustration and need. There isn't a doubt in Sherlock's mind it will make an appearance tonight.  
  
Sherlock is going to enjoy this immensely.  
  
"You'd rather I didn't flood the floor first, I'm assuming,” he says, twisting away from John to lean over and turn off the water, the tub steaming and full. His shirt slips off completely, and he slides his trousers and pants past his hips, his backside deliberately to John as he leans and steps out of them.  
  
There's champagne on ice next to the tub, two flutes lined up adjacently; fine linen towels warm on the rack. The room smells clean, and fresh, reminds Sherlock of his childhood, of trips into the city, overnights in this very same hotel. It is no longer the sudden slap of history, of memories, as it used to be; has mellowed into something at most bittersweet. He almost enjoys it. "Well?" he asks, and turns, just enough to glance at his husband as he steps inside.   
  
Sherlock turns away from him and John shudders, watches Sherlock undress so casually, as if John wasn't slowly unraveling on the floor beneath him. He twists his fingers into the rug underneath him as Sherlock strips out of his clothes, bares that beautiful long back, those impossibly long legs. Sherlock step into the tub -- his cock visible for just one moment as he puts one leg in, then the other. John makes a sound in his throat and stumbles to his feet, embarrassed by how fucking enormous his erection feels from barely any stimulation at all, hard and jutting up from between his legs. "Sherlock," he says, almost helpless, "I wanted to--"  
  
"I know what you wanted," Sherlock says. He holds out a hand and John accepts it, letting Sherlock help him into the tub. "We have all night. Wouldn't you rather wait?"  
  
He doesn't want to wait -- he wants to kiss and suck and fuck, and he wants it all _right now_. He has half a mind to bully between Sherlock's legs and give him an orgasm that'll shake the roof to the ground, and the only thing that keeps him from doing just that is Sherlock's hand in his -- light and gentle, yet firm in a way that says Sherlock isn't going to be very accommodating to John's plan. "Surely you've realized already that you're not in control here," he says, expression utterly unreadable. He lowers them down slowly, Sherlock leaning against the lip of the bathtub with John in his lap, chest to chest. Their cocks brush and the sensation is _exquisite_ , but when John tries to reach down Sherlock catches both his hands, curling and tangling them together in such a way that John won't be able to get himself free.

The sensation licks up his spine, sends shivers tumbling down his back, curling low and deep in his stomach. "I could take you."

"You really, really couldn't," Sherlock replies with an almost condescending smile. "Why don't you get more comfortable?"  
  
John thinks about this for a moment. He isn't sure where Sherlock is taking this, only that he is already finding this hard, so out of control, so out of his comfort zone. Submission like he needs, like Sherlock is gently demanding, isn't in his nature, and yet his own capability for it is obvious, even to him.  
  
He studies Sherlock's face and reads love and tenderness there as he always does, but lurking around the edges is something harder, something darker, something deliciously dangerous. Whatever Sherlock's plans are, John decides, it's going to be fun.  
  
"Is that what all this was?" he asks suddenly, grinning like the flirt he can sometimes be. "Wine and dined me, and now you're expecting me to open my legs?"  
  
"Oh John," Sherlock murmurs, amused. "By the end of the night, you're going to do much more than that for me."  
  
John's face becomes confrontational, but playfully so, like an adolescent ready to wrestle his mates. No one had ever looked at Sherlock that way before, even when he was an adolescent; he hadn't engendered that kind of affection in his peers, mostly by his own design.  
  
It convinces Sherlock to kiss John. He's unable to help himself, in any case. John leans into him, presses himself against Sherlock, a delicious, wet slide. Sherlock moves his hands, trails fingertips down John's body, plays his favorite Sonata on John's skin as his fingers disappear below the water.  
  
He lets go of John's mouth and latches on to the underside of his jaw instead. John makes a low noise in his throat right there against Sherlock’s lips, leans his head back, vulnerable, undeniably willing. Sherlock's right hand lifts almost of its own accord to hold the back of John's head, the water splashing, dripping. Sherlock hums absently into John's throat while his left hand finally reaches its destination, slipping, tortuously light, across the puckered opening of John's hole.  
  
John breathes in sharply, sliding back then forward again. He is gratifyingly, intoxicatingly hard. His arousal is heady, makes Sherlock feel all-powerful, invincible. Sherlock teases him ruthlessly -- as he's done all night -- keeps stroking, slipping in and out with barely a finger, the tip of his thumb. It's driving John mad, that much is obvious, but Sherlock will finish this exactly when he's ready and not a moment before, and certainly not in the tub. He leans up and whispers in John's ear, explains, "I'm going to take you in that massively over-sized bed in the next room, fuck you until you scream, and when I finally let you come it will be with not a hand on your prick at all." He nips at the skin behind the ear. "That's what 'all this' is, my dear."

John's eyes fall low, and his mouth trembles open, and he swallows against the sound that wants to come out of him at Sherlock's words and the easy way he says them, that states implicitly that he isn't going to take 'no' for an answer. Sherlock's fingers, and the pressure right inside of him where the nerves are so sensitive, makes him writhe, pushing against Sherlock’s shoulders. He wants to be stretched out on Sherlock's fingers, wants to be wide and wet around his cock, wants to be filled up until John swears he can feel him nudging into his throat. And he wants all of that hard and fast and _right_ _now_.  
  
Sherlock laughs against his neck, slips his thumb free from John's hole to grasp the cheeks of his arse, squeezing and pulling them apart. "Oh no you don't," he murmurs beneath John's chin, nipping.  
  
"Please, I--" He squirms forward against Sherlock's cock, back into his hands. "Come _on_."  
  
"I'll give you two choices," Sherlock replies, licking along the straining tendon in his neck. "You can come now, if you want, right here and right now. I'll bring you off with my hand, here in the water, but later, when I fuck you, you won't be allowed to."  
  
John feels the words like a physical blow, writing themselves across the breadth of his arousal. He swallows, licking at his lower lip until he can speak. "Oh yeah?" he asks, raspy. "And how are you going to stop me?"  
  
"I have my ways," Sherlock says calmly, thumbing the head of John's cock, poking up out of the water and slick with a pulse of pre-come. "I'll fill you up, John, until you're dripping with it, and in the morning we'll go home and you'll be filthy and wet and unsatisfied."  
  
The words are so familiar and suddenly John trembles openly, fingers fisting in Sherlock's hair, around the lip of the bathtub. "Oh God," he croaks, because he said something so similar to Sherlock not even a month ago, the evening Adella took the children to Harrods and John systematically took Sherlock apart until he was a fucked-out, aching mess. The night _John Watson_ became _John Holmes_ , and he claimed his territory like an invading army. "It's payback."  
  
Sherlock grins against his throat. "Or," he says, as if John hadn't said a word, "you can control yourself, and wait, and come when I fuck you. Let me reiterate that I won't be touching you, but you _will_ come, John, I promise you."  
  
John's mortified by how full and aching he is between his legs, how swollen he feels, how much _he wants to have sex_. That Sherlock could reduce him to this is always thrilling, makes his heart beat too fast and his blood pound through his body. "It's an experiment?"  
  
"In a manner of speaking," Sherlock says, amused. "Choose, John."  
  
Either option is awful, and wonderful, and undignified and glorious and perfect. As much as he wants to come, a quick orgasm, he wants the pleasure of Sherlock inside of him more, the tension of his cock hanging between his legs as Sherlock pounds into him. He wants Sherlock's hand, where it's wrapped around his cock, wants it badly -- but he wants the unknown more, the danger and excitement of not knowing how it is he's going to come without anyone touching him.  
  
He groans and tugs Sherlock's hand away from his cock, and Sherlock chuckles warmly, kissing him slow and sweet. "Good choice,” he says, smiling. He's thrilled with John's decision, that John trusts him that much, will give himself wholly to Sherlock no matter what his body is telling him. It never gets old. Sherlock lets go of John, slides his knees up and sinks down on his back until he's fully underwater. John rolls his eyes at Sherlock's childish play and Sherlock pulls him down in retaliation, twisting them so John sinks under instead.  
  
John can't get purchase in the tub and slides under the water, splashing, then orients himself and sits up as the water sloshes over the side of the tub. "You're ridiculous," he sputters. Doesn't matter; now his hair is charmingly stuck to his head, sticking up at random, dark brown the way it always is when wet, his eyelashes stuck together in clumps. Sherlock drags him close and presses them together, fits their mouths against each other again, which shuts John up nicely. So perfect, this angle, this touch.  
  
They stay like that for long moments, until their presses become shifts become thrusts, until they're riding far too close to the edge, both of them, for all that Sherlock would like to pretend he has some self-control. John has made that notion a farce, an altogether too-often failure on Sherlock's part, damn the man. He has no idea how completely he drives Sherlock around the bend.  
  
He pulls back, presses his hands on either side of John's face and pushes them back, his fingers gently scraping through John's hair. "Come along, now."

He stands carefully, stepping out of the tub, before extending a hand for John, who follows suit. Sherlock snags the closest towel and dries off perfunctorily; John does the same but takes longer, long enough for Sherlock to open the champagne and pour two glasses.   
  
John eyes him, completely annoyed at the ease with which Sherlock is doing all this, the composure, the lack of outward yearning. He takes a slow, measured sip of the champagne, eyes widening at the explosion of bubbles, the cool flavor. “This is good.”

Sherlock smirks, and downs his in one go, just to watch John’s eyes narrow with laughter.   
  
He guides John to the bedroom, takes the flute and places it on the bedside table next to his own before John down into the deep, soft mattress. John moans incoherently, his cock rigid against his stomach, so patient, his John, a whole night of torment and still, he holds out for more. _My dear, my dear, my dear_ , he thinks.  
  
"This isn't payback," Sherlock says into the curve of John's side. "This is thank you. Do you have any idea what that felt like?" he asks, tongue sliding into the dip of John's navel. "To be spread so wide, so exposed, to be taken so completely?" His mouth slides down, into the crease of John's thigh. "Just when you think it can't go any deeper, you can't stretch any further, to be pressed down, _made_ to take it." His tongue darts out to trail in between John's legs, under his sac, while Sherlock's hands spread him wide. He hums, deep, against John's skin, and licks across the furled skin of John’s hole.   
  
John jumps, as if he's been electrocuted, and makes a sound he very, very rarely ever makes, a mortifying mix between a yelp and a groan. He feels Sherlock shaking with laughter but he doesn't care, bending his legs and tangling his fingers into Sherlock's hair.  
  
Sherlock doesn't do this -- not often, and only in moments like these. Not because he doesn't like it, but because of John's reaction, each and every single time. He's blushing so much the heat is almost radiating off his skin; from his belly button to his cheeks, it's nothing but a hot splash of red. He shudders into the sensation and Sherlock's expert touch, pitiful noises falling from his lips as he struggles both to push into it, and twist away. "Sherlock," he begs, and Sherlock pulls free, but only to smirk at him and take one of the pillows from the head of the bed. He pushes it firmly under John's hips, opening his legs up so that they fall apart easily, open and wide.  
  
John goes to pull at his cock and Sherlock bats his hand away; John narrows his eyes and tries again, and this time Sherlock rears up over him, pressing his weight down into John, and pulling his hands up over his head. "Be good," he murmurs, kissing behind John's ear. The smell of his hair is intoxicating, the sensation of the tip of Sherlock's cock dragging over his belly unbelievable.  
  
"I'm trying," John says; he doesn't even sound like himself. "Please, I want..."  
  
"What? Hmm? What do you want, John?"  
  
John squirms underneath him, hands opening and closing as he struggles to voice it. "Sherlock," he begs.  
  
"I think I know," his husband murmurs, kissing down his neck, to his nipples, pink and hard and tight. He licks across one, sending John jolting upwards with a cry as the feeling goes right to the head of his cock. "Is that it?" he asks, innocent, doing the same to his other, more sensitive nipple.  
  
Sherlock is busy at his chest for so long that by the time he lets go with one last, ironic little kiss, John's chest feels hot, on fire, bitten and licked and sucked bright red. The cold air makes them so tight it hurts, but before John can touch them, soothe them, Sherlock catches his hands again. "That's twice now," he murmurs, kissing the little curve of John's stomach. He's so beautiful, hair falling over his eyes, bright green peeking between those dark curls. "Do you need help controlling them?"  
  
"Sherlock," John croaks, eyes rolling up into his head when he doesn’t answer quickly enough and Sherlock’s back dips with a slow, sweet grind of his hips. "Please, I --"  
  
"That's what I thought."  
  
Sherlock rears up from the bed, pressing John's wrists down into the mattress once in warning, before going to the tangle of their clothing in the bathroom. The whisk of his belt leaving the loops of his trousers makes John fist his fingers into his own hair, his arm into his mouth, to keep from grabbing his cock, which is leaving a wet, dribbling smear on his belly.  
  
His husband stops at the side of the bed. He isn't smiling, but John can tell he's pleased, from his crinkled eyes to the slow uptick of the corner of his mouth. "Good," he murmurs, sweeping his fingers through John's hair, pulling John’s wrist away from his mouth. "That's good."  
  
John stares up at him, as Sherlock drags his hands up over his head, carefully loops the belt over and over his wrists. Stares up at him as Sherlock stares back. "Not too tight?"  
  
He's afraid of the sounds he’ll make if he tries to speak, and so he settles for shaking his head, twisting his hands in his bonds -- not to break it, but to feel how well he's been tied. Sherlock runs the backs of his fingers tenderly down his cheek, dips his thumb gently between John's lips. "Let's see about getting you filled up. Would you like that?"  
  
Whatever he sees in John's face is answer enough -- Sherlock smiles, kisses him gently. His thumb leaves a warm line down John's cheek.  
  
He climbs back up on the bed, climbs _over_ John, and John doesn't know what he's doing for a moment, doesn't understand why Sherlock is arranging himself up on top of him, until Sherlock's knees bracket John's ears and suddenly --  
  
"Oh Jesus," he says faintly. He reaches up, greedy, for the hard cock swinging down over his face.

Sherlock watches the shock of pure lust strike across John's face, his eyes dark, his lips already parted, open and wet and willing. Sherlock licks his own bottom lip in anticipation, reviewing the image of John splayed out on the bed, wanton, with his wrist in his mouth and his legs, those gorgeous thighs, spread wide. It's going to serve him wonderfully for a long time to come.  
  
He shifts back, just enough to let John shuffle up on a pillow, then he leans forward again. John's mouth opens wider without hesitation, and Sherlock's not sure who’s groaning as he slides past John's lips, or if it's both of them, he's too busy with the sight and the feeling, the wet, slick heat, to really pay attention.  
  
John sucks him down like it's the only thing keeping him alive, like he _needs_ this. The picture John makes is breathtaking -- his eyes closed, pink dusting up his cheeks and down his throat, and that mouth, that beautiful mouth, spread tight and hot and red.

John’s entire body relaxes into it, as if he’s finally found relief now that he’s filled with cock, with Sherlock’s cock. Sherlock doesn't mean to close his eyes but the thought is overwhelming, makes the blood pulse, makes his balls draw up against his body, which is when he realizes that it’s _exactly what John wants_.

When he looks down it’s to John’s eyes, staring up at Sherlock with smug contentment – as if he’s finally getting exactly what he thinks he wants.

"No," he gasps, and, painfully, _desperately_ , pulls himself away.  
  
"Sherlock,” John groans, his voice a rasp, and licks his lips to catch the taste, lifting his head to try and catch the head of Sherlock’s cock in his mouth once more.   
  
Sherlock turns, climbs off from over John to his side. "I’ll give you points for effort," he says breathlessly, doing his best not to pant, not to sound too close to the precipice. “Consider that a test, one which you just failed.”

John’s smug pleasure is slowly fading into a glower, though the effort of it is clearly nearly too much. His skin is sheened bright with sweat and he’s become agitated,  _fidgeting_ , which Sherlock didn’t think his husband was capable of. One leg goes down, then folds back up; he twists against his bonds restlessly, nearly rolling to one side, all the while wearing the most frustrated expression, as if he cannot believe Sherlock’s audacity in removing himself from the equation.

He’s let this all go on for too long. He’d assumed John was enjoying the status quo, Sherlock on his back (or bent over whichever piece of furniture was most convenient), or on his knees, or one memorable time while hiding under a parked car, which had been Sherlock’s first brush with the best of two worlds. He’d simply assumed that as time had gone on John had become more comfortable taking the more dominant role in their lovemaking.

That John gave of himself, took Sherlock into his body as often as Sherlock wanted, wasn’t the issue. John was the single-most giving, generous partner Sherlock had ever had, but that he was more comfortable holding the power, rather than giving it, had been obvious since Sherlock’s miraculous return from the dead nearly six years ago.

This was what he’d been missing, once he’d finally gotten around to identifying it. The evidence had been stockpiling for months, nearly a year, but Sherlock – in a truly amazing miscalculation – hadn’t seen it for what it was until that night a month ago, until John had taken on his name and taken Sherlock just as brutally, leaving them both aching with the hot, bright flame of a love which had only grown stronger, deeper as the years had gone on.

That was the beginning of it, the moment he realized something was missing.

He sees it even now.

John is agitated, but not in the way he wants Sherlock to think. He’s restless and squirming, _struggling_ in a way Sherlock hasn’t seen in many years. He can almost remember John like this when they first met, though even then he had a take-charge attitude. Still, Sherlock can remember the soft, warm joy in John’s eyes when Sherlock had gotten thoroughly sick of Captain Watson and done a little take-charge of his own, the way John had both folded into himself and become _more_ himself, as if a lingering wound had finally healed.

He sees glimpses of it, once in a while. The night he had John against the wall, as bound then as he is now by gravity and his own thrilling reaction to the danger of it. Even then he’d shoved Sherlock over onto his back once it was all over and bullied between his legs, shattered him with an orgasm so incredibly good Sherlock hadn’t been able to think clearly for nearly fifteen minutes after the fact. Even then, he had taken control. Even then, something had been missing between them, something integral and as vital as the blood in his veins. That John hadn’t seen it, or sensed it, was obvious. To Sherlock, it had been as bright as a neon sign, flashing over John’s head.

He will forgive himself for missing this, one day, and press a thousand kisses into John’s skin, each of them as much an apology as the next.

John is watching him, eyes dilated, panting as if he can’t help himself. He squirms against his bonds, tugging at the belt – then more sharply when Sherlock opens the bedside drawer. In it are six different types of lubrication, condoms, and other items that Sherlock doesn’t look twice at. John won’t be undone with toys or chains tonight; he will be undone by Sherlock’s hand, his mouth, his cock.

He shifts back down between John's legs, licking wet and messy down his cock, under his sac, across his hole. John moans low in his chest, flexes his hips unconsciously, _begs_ Sherlock. Sherlock's not sure which of them is more undone. "Do you even know what you look like?” he murmurs, slicking his fingers. He slides two of them into John as far as they'll go, and watches his husband wail beneath him. 

John drags his arms down, tied so tightly together, to muffle his sharp, helpless cries into his bicep. The taste of Sherlock's precome coats the roof of his mouth, flooding his tongue with saliva. He wants, he _wants_ to be filled up, wants Sherlock's cock back inside of him and he doesn't care where. He squirms so much he almost bucks Sherlock off of him, struggling against the belt with renewed purpose. He wants to throw Sherlock over onto his back and mount him, fill himself up and fuck himself. He’s tired of waiting, he doesn’t want to wait anymore, he wants to fuck himself and fuck Sherlock and drag them both, screaming, over the precipice. He _wants_ and Sherlock isn’t _giving it to him_.

He’s suddenly angry, _furious_ with need, yanking at his tied arms, against Sherlock's touch, and he doesn’t know why only he’s done, he’s _done_. “Untie me," he snarls.

Sherlock studies him, those brilliant, deadly eyes of his that see right down to his marrow. "No," Sherlock says, his touch so slick and right where John needs it to be, finally pressing firmly on his prostate in a slow, careful circle. John cries out, back bowing up and hips canting down into Sherlock's methodical touch. It's glorious, it feels so good; his cock is dark red, dripping continuously as Sherlock slowly, slowly massages his prostate, milks him from the inside until he's a dripping, soaking fucking mess. The head of his cock slips against his skin over and over, a feather-light tease. He squirms against Sherlock's fingers -- not enough pressure, not nearly enough, and this time he bites down into his bicep to keep the scream of frustration, of need, in.  
  
Sherlock leisurely stops stroking inside to add more lubrication, to touch and kiss John’s thighs, to rub his lips along John's sac, tight and full. John wants to twist his legs up around Sherlock's neck and flip them over, but Sherlock has taken care of that -- John's got his bottom half propped up on that pillow, his knees pulled back almost to his chest, held wide open by Sherlock's hand, there under his knee, and by his will. He looks up at John, and there's the amusement now. John won't flip them over because Sherlock is in control, it's as simple as that; John will do what he says because Sherlock wants him to, and for no other reason. John moans again, angry, desperate, when he realizes just how caught he is, how easily he's fallen into this trap, and how very, very much he wants to let go. He bucks down into Sherlock's touch for more, he wants _more_ , and tosses his head on the pillow.  
  
It's then that he realizes there's a floor-to-ceiling mirror, opposite them on the wall. Enormous, ornate, made of what looks like silver and bronze. It’s reflecting the room. The bed. John, red-faced and panting, and Sherlock, cool and utterly in control between John's spread legs.  
  
The picture they make is so startling John freezes. Himself, arms lashed together and skin red from his struggling, slicked with sweat. His chest is heaving, his cock is hard and heavy on his belly, and his legs are up and open and wide, unmistakable in their clear message. Beneath he can see the swell of his sac, and Sherlock, the dark head and eyes meeting his in the reflection, his hips moving lazily against the bed as he presses three fingers into John's body.  
  
"Oh God, oh my God," John gasps. The stretch of his hole around Sherlock's fingers is secondary to the pulse of pleasure it brings. He can't keep his eyes off of their reflection for more than a minute, the picture they make -- of himself, small against Sherlock's massive length, all that creamy skin that goes on for eons, Sherlock’s long beautiful back and the swell of his arse that clenches and releases rhythmically as he thrusts against the sheets.   
  
"I know," Sherlock murmurs, kissing his upturned knee, down the back of his thigh. John turns his head away from the mirror so he won't see how shiny his own eyes are. "I know it's difficult. You just have to give in."  
  
"I don't know how," John sobs out. It's never been so hard. How could he not have realized that he needed it so much?  
  
"Of course you know how," Sherlock says. He pulls his fingers free and leans up over him, in the valley his open legs have made, and kisses his eyelids, his cheeks, his mouth, with the same slow, tender intensity he's had since they arrived here at the hotel. "You're not in control here, John. I am. I'm going to make love to you when I'm ready."  
  
"Now," John says, demanding.  
  
"No," Sherlock replies, brushing his fingers through the short strands of John's sweat-soaked hair. "Not yet. You're not there yet."  
  
"I am," he argues, and Sherlock snorts, kisses him again. He gives him more this time, delves deep, and John arches up to his kiss, opens his mouth to it, accepts what he's being given. Sherlock kisses him wet and wonderful and perfect, just how John likes it, until he feels that kiss inside, blood pumping hot.  
  
Sherlock reaches down, without breaking their kiss, and pushes his fingers back in, into the emptiness John hadn't even realized was so awful. He fills him back up and John makes a helpless noise, thrusting his hips and looping his tied arms up over Sherlock's neck. The first time he tries to pull him deeper Sherlock pulls away. The second time as well, and the third, until John realizes what he's doing and only rests his tied wrists on the back of Sherlock's head. He's rewarded with a deeper kiss, a harder screw inside.  
  
Sherlock alternates -- one finger, then three, then two, without pattern. He strokes in and touches his prostate, then not again for three more thrusts, or four, or one. There's no rhyme or reason to what he's doing and John slowly relaxes into it, into the steady, warm touches that are fanning a deeper, fuller pleasure inside of him. He turns again to look at the mirror, at Sherlock stretched out on top of him, at the way they fit so effortlessly together. He loops his legs up around Sherlock's waist, and Sherlock waits for him, stilling.   
  
Sherlock waits to see what John will do, whether he will acquiesce to Sherlock, to himself. It's all there, written across his face in brilliant, bold colors, in the shift of his brows, the twist of his lips between his teeth. He's gorgeous, strong and steady and masculine, his cock a heavy press against Sherlock's stomach.

He can see the moment John gives in, lets go; it's in the way he relaxes, releases his hands from their fists, lets his eyes slide closed. It's utterly mesmerizing.

Sherlock shifts down to press a kiss to his chest, right over his heart, which thuds under Sherlock's lips. It's not just passion, it's adrenaline, fighting to the end. "John,” Sherlock soothes, mouthing the word against hot skin. "It's okay." He moves his fingers in John, presses strong and sure against his prostate, drags them all the way out and back again.

John is more or less continuously vocal now, gasping, groaning, tossing out obscenities and pleas and Sherlock's name, over and over and over in an endless, breathless litany. Sherlock leans back up to kiss him, fits them together, so perfect, his fingers spread wide as far in as he can push them. John's cock has long since painted a wet streak on them both, mixes with their sweat, messy and hot. When Sherlock pulls back John opens his eyes, regards him with a look that is unfathomable, deep and dark, his hair stuck to his forehead.  
  
"I love you,” Sherlock says, matter of fact, out of sync with the tone of their touches, his plans. He hadn't known he was going to say it until the words reach his own ears. John doesn't seem to mind; he loops his arms back over Sherlock's neck, drags him down, his heart behind his lips. Sherlock goes willingly but for a moment, then pulls back, nipping at John's bottom lip on the way. "Arms up," he orders, leaning back as John complies.  
  
Sherlock pulls his fingers from John's hole and uses them to slick his own cock, long since gone rock hard, deep red. He lines himself up and presses a thumb against John's hole, holds it open, presses in just the tip. John groans, deep in the back of his throat. His arms fall back down so he can muffle his noises against his arm, as though they're still at home, still have little ears to worry about.  
  
It needs to be corrected.  
  
Sherlock shoves in, _all_ the way in, making sure to twitch his hips up as deeply as he can at the end. At the same time he drags John's arms away from his face and pins them above his head at the wrists in one sharp, brutal move.  
  
It gets him the look he's been waiting for. John is utterly _gone_.  
  
It's quick and vicious and fills John's entire universe. He arches up into it, into the sudden, massive stretch, shouts hoarse and broken. He bucks hard at the pleasure that slams into him, and when Sherlock pulls back and thrusts into him again he realizes he's fighting his bonds. He wants to touch so badly, _so badly_ , and Sherlock leans over him and murmurs, "Do you think you can keep your hands away from your cock?"  
  
"Yes," John says, with a voice he doesn't recognize.  
  
Sherlock thrusts again, a hard, pounding movement that sends them skittering up the bed a bit and John _keens_ , lost, lost, Sherlock the very center of his universe. He feels hot and swollen and heavy, lit up deep with pleasure. The full, tight stretch of being taken.    
  
His husband smiles and reaches up to thumb the belt open. One quick tug and John is free, and he instantly wraps his arms tightly around Sherlock. His fingers scrabble down his husband's back to his arse to feel it tighten with each thrust. He turns his head back to the mirror to watch them, to look at his hands on Sherlock's arse, and Sherlock catches his attention, meeting his eyes in the reflection. "You like watching us," he says, deeply amused by the simple fact.

Sherlock's smile softens, no matter how sharp, how bullying his thrusts are. They feel so good, heady and constant, and Sherlock nips lightly, delicately at his collarbones, sucks at the spot beneath his earlobe that makes him shudder. He's going at a slow, steady, thorough pace and doesn't seem inclined to go any faster anytime soon; John reaches underneath them to touch where they're joined, feeling himself stretched, feeling the hard, thick heat of Sherlock's cock as it pushes into him. "Faster."

"No," Sherlock says. There's sweat running down his temples, but he looks calm, peaceful almost, and if he were anyone other than Sherlock, he'd be smiling from ear to ear. "I could do this all day."  
  
And the worst part is, John knows he could -- Sherlock has unbelievable stamina. They’d once spent an entire afternoon in the first year of their marriage fucking. Granted, it had been for an experiment to prove a serial rapist guilty, and they'd taken breaks in between bouts of fucking, but John had reaped the rewards, even if he hadn't been able to sit for almost a week afterwards.  
  
Sherlock reaches down, strokes a hand down John's cock, which, John's sure, is just to watch him light up like a Christmas tree. He howls, short, bitten off, teeth grinding down against the sound as pleasure wracks him. " _Sherlock_!"  
  
"There it is," Sherlock says, and does it again, just to hear John's choked cry. "I hope that was enough," he murmurs, "because it's not going to happen again."  
  
John groans, shifting his hips up desperately to meet each of Sherlock's thrusts. His hands are at Sherlock's hips, slide back down to his arse and squeeze.   
  
"You know it's going to happen," he murmurs into John’s throat. John feels so bloody _good_ , deep and tight and fever hot around his cock. The idea of this, _just_ this, bringing John off is intoxicating, and the dark, greedy part of Sherlock wants it _now_. "You’re going to come and I'll not be touching your prick at all."  
  
John shouts Sherlock's name again as Sherlock executes a slow grind of his hips, pressing so hard against John's prostate it almost hurts. When John makes a broken, always surprising high-pitched sound Sherlock can't take it anymore and crushes their mouths together, licking his way in ferociously, nearly crushing John altogether. He's covering John now, surrounding him, pressing into him in almost every way possible; he pulls his mouth back just enough to turn John's head, so he can look at the mirror, at the images that have so unexpectedly caught his attention. He wants John to see what Sherlock is telling him, what he so needs to hear. "You're _mine_ ," Sherlock whispers, his lips flush against John's ear.   
  
Sherlock bites at his earlobe, once, distracting him when Sherlock pulls out, leaving him open and empty and grasping around nothing. He always forgets how athletic Sherlock is when he wants to be, and is given a reminder of the strength coiled in those lean muscles when Sherlock pushes him over onto his belly without missing a beat. He shoves the pillow back under John's hips, careful to avoid his cock, and John is watching in the mirror, _sobbing_ as Sherlock presses John's thighs together, and pulls his cheeks apart, and thrusts back in.  
  
The angle is obscene -- Sherlock is making him hold his legs closed, and it hurts and it feels so good. Sherlock's cock feels massive inside of him, pressure along every inch of that length buried to the hilt, and he watches, pleasure-drunk, as Sherlock pulls back and thrusts into him, making John's whole body jolt. He's red faced and quivering, and the endless loop of Sherlock thrusting inside of him, and _watching_ Sherlock thrust inside of him, is making something short-circuit in John's brain. He's trying desperately not to scream, so much so that he finally has to push his fingers in his mouth, and Sherlock laughs in his ear as he blankets him, rubs one sweat-soaked cheek against John's. "There we are," he says, breathless, overjoyed, as every thrust pushes sound up out of John's throat, makes him shake like he has palsy.  
  
Each thrust hits his prostate dead-center, and the need to touch his cock is so strong that he's grateful when Sherlock snatches his free hand and holds it, pinned, to the bed. He wants to prove to Sherlock that he can listen, that he can do as he's told, even as his cock screams between his legs.  
  
The image they make is pure pornography, pure _sex_. Sherlock is bigger than him, but it's never been something that has featured so strongly in their lovemaking as it is right now. His longer legs bracket John's, his longer torso covers him, _smothers_ him completely. He's pressed into the bed, and Sherlock is using every inch, every pound he has on John to bend him to his will, to take exactly what he wants.  
  
John can't remember a time when he felt the keen edge of Sherlock's possessiveness so sharply. He can’t remember a time when he needed it so much, as fundamental as breathing.  
  
Sherlock pulls back, almost all the way, and thrusts back in -- the sound that comes from John this time is loud, though he is trying desperately to muffle it with his fingers. Sherlock laughs and does it again, and again, and the shouts turn into cries on each thrust, louder and louder until John’s throat is aching and tears are spilling hot down his face. Sherlock rears back, pulling John back at the same time so Sherlock is on his knees and John is in his lap. He scrabbles up to grab hold of Sherlock's neck, the arm Sherlock slings around his waist. "Look at you," he says into John's neck, as if John can see anything else but the two of them in the mirror, so intertwined. He's stunned by his cock, so red it's almost purple, so wet his precome is rolling down from where it's smeared on his belly. Sherlock’s cock is massive inside of him, stretching him so tightly he can feel the pull in his muscles. They looked wrecked, devastated. Sherlock reaches down to cup John's sac, heart roaring against John's back and breathing so hard he's panting. He rolls John's testicles in one hand gently, then more firmly, squeezing them. "Look at these. They're taut, so full just for me."  
  
John shudders violently, turns his face into Sherlock's neck. It's only for a moment before he’s compelled to look at the two of them again, sweat-slick and fucking. Has he always rolled his back into Sherlock's thrusts? How are Sherlock's hands so big on him? Has Sherlock ever looked that overwhelmed? He can't breathe, can't think, caught in a place he loves and hates equally. He turns his mouth into Sherlock's neck. "Please fuck me."  
  
Sherlock makes a low, dirty sound, a sound right out of the center of him, that speaks to how fucking devastated this is making him. Hearing it makes John moan in response. "Is that what you want?"  
  
"Yes, fuck me, I want it hard," John hears himself beg, like he's having an out of body experience.  
  
Sherlock pushes him back down on the bed, hands and knees this time, and John stares up at them in the mirror as Sherlock draws his hips back and sets to fucking him like John knows he can. He's been playing with John this entire time, but now the race to the finish has settled in their bones, and Sherlock fucks him like John wants, like they both need.  
  
_I can come like this_ , he thinks suddenly, hysterical, dropping down to his elbows when his shaking arms will no longer hold him. He grabs his own hair with one hand, the sheets with the other, and pushes back into every thrust. Sherlock fans the pleasure until orgasm starts to build in the base of his spine, tingling across his limbs, building and building until he's held there, on the brink, wracked with pleasure and anticipation but unable to go over, unable to, unable to--  
  
He hears himself scream, and comes so hard he almost blacks out.  
  
Sherlock would have come no matter what -- even if he hadn't been pounding into John’s body with a force that was shaking the bed, even if John hadn’t nearly sent Sherlock over the edge when he’d looked up at him, those eyes gone dark with pleasure, and begged so prettily to fuck him, please fuck him _hard_ , even if John hadn't clamped down on Sherlock's cock in gorgeous, indescribable agony as he came.   
  
He had done all that, but it doesn't matter. Sherlock would have come just listening to the sound John made, his husband so lost in their lovemaking he’d lost all of that careful control and screamed as he came, as if the force of his pleasure had no other escape. The _thrill_ of driving John to that point, of the physical sensation, of the _victory_ \-- evident as John comes, untouched, underneath them -- it all coalesces into one perfect moment, freezes the world and makes his senses implode.  
  
He has no idea how long it is before he reorients himself, can track his parts again. He's not sure when his mouth ended up on the back of John's neck but he can't move it, though he does retract his teeth. His right arm is slung low around John's waist, pulling him in tight, as though he's trying to keep John from going somewhere.

John is making low, sobbing moans in his throat Sherlock has never heard from him before, in all their years of marriage. When he turns John's face towards him he isn't crying, though; he is, in fact, delirious with pleasure, shuddering with aftershocks. It is the most beautiful thing John has ever given him, and despite himself his cock pulses, wrenching a moan from him and a broken cry from John. He kisses the cry from that panting mouth, down over his shoulder and back where it's heaving with every breath.

This kind of success is a high Sherlock never thought possible. It is catharsis he didn’t even know he needed, as the final barrier that had been standing between them for years – a barrier neither of them even knew was still there – finally crumbles like dust at their feet.

Their legs are tangled together, twisted in the bedclothes that are half on the floor. There's a long rip in one of the sheets. John is streaked with sweat, and in a few hours he will be mottled with bruises already coming up on his hips, his thighs, his biceps. His face is streaked with tears, and he has finally gone quiet, limp. Restlessness eased.

“John,” Sherlock murmurs.

John opens his eyes, gummy and wet. He doesn’t seem inclined to move, so Sherlock does, pulling his hips back just enough until he’s slipped free. John moans at the loss of it and Sherlock shushes him, climbing over to John’s other side so he can face him, so John doesn’t have to move. His husband’s eyes track him, though they’re pleasure drunk in a way he hasn’t seen since the night John found him at the illicit boxing ring, pounding a man’s face in.

He noses close and presses his fingers back into John, just to watch his husband’s eyes flutter with contentment. Sherlock knows how much he hates the empty feeling after sex. “Well, that certainly went better than I expected.”

John’s eyes open again, regarding him sleepily, and with so much love it’s humbling. He presses soft kisses to John’s arm between them, his fingers where they’d been tangled in the sheets and are now as limp as the rest of him. “Expected?”

“You were too busy with the mirror to notice the room.”

A dull wash of pink floods John’s cheeks again. “I like the mirror.”

“I know.”

It had been a risky move on his part, but he’s hardly been ignorant to the way John stared at them in the bathroom mirror at home when he thought Sherlock wasn’t looking. Ignorant about other things, yes, but not about the mirror.

John’s hole twitches around his fingers. It’s slight, almost unnoticeable, but John’s looking at his mouth. He’s going to be ready again, soon. They have an entire night, and though it won’t make up for the lost time between them, Sherlock fully intends to do what he can to put an honest dent in it.

John’s unfocused, intent on Sherlock’s fingers in his arse where he has begun milking them, slowly, as if he can’t help it. He’s never done that before, or looked at Sherlock like he is now, almost… almost _shy_ , which is never a word Sherlock would have ever thought to associate with his husband. It is a relief, palpable in its intensity. Sherlock answers John’s silent question gently with slow thrusts of his fingers, and John’s breath leaves him with a whoosh.

John stops suddenly, and opens his eyes. “Wait, what did you mean? What didn’t I notice?”

Sherlock smirks, arching a brow, and John lifts himself up enough to look over his shoulder.

Behind them, flanking the bathroom, is the most preposterous collection of sex paraphernalia Sherlock has ever seen. A sex swing is hanging in front of an open closet where an entire dungeon’s worth of toys has been laid out, from whips and chains to clamps and plugs. There is enough leather to clothe a biker gang for a solid decade. Sherlock rolls his eyes. “I requested the honeymoon suite, and this is what they gave us. Honestly, it’s a fairly telling commentary on modern marriage practices, though I do find the psychological ramifications intriguing.”

John looks down at him for one, breathless second before exploding into laughter, and Sherlock can’t help but join him, rolling them over until John is on top and laughing so hard Sherlock can feel it, from head to toe. “My dear,” he murmurs, cupping his face, smiling when John catches his thumb and bites the heel of it, playful and intriguing and the center around which Sherlock orbited. “Ready?”

John smiles back at him, eyes bright and beautiful.

“Yes,” he says.

 


End file.
